


Vanilla

by Lochinvar



Series: Amuse-bouche [6]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Anniversary, Boys In Love, Boys Kissing, Established Relationship, Fluff, Food Porn, Ice Cream, Implied/Referenced Sex, Insecure Dean Winchester, Loving Sam Winchester, M/M, Marriage, No Sex, No Smut, Pie, Romance, Romantic Sam Winchester, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, no kinks, offstage sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-17
Updated: 2018-07-17
Packaged: 2019-06-11 17:21:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15320433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lochinvar/pseuds/Lochinvar
Summary: While celebrating their wedding anniversary, Dean asks a question.





	Vanilla

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Canon_Is_Relative](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Canon_Is_Relative/gifts), [stardust_made](https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardust_made/gifts).



> Own nothing; rely on the kindness of strangers.
> 
> Kudos and comments appreciated - thank you.

One year since the wedding, a private exchange of vows and rings on a beach with the closest in attendance.

Sam’s anniversary gift to husband Dean: a week at an opulent Oregon oceanside estate, the former home of someone rich and important. The family sold it to a high-end hotel chain, where, ever since, it has offered respite to those who can afford to stay, even if they are not important.

The long-departed Men of Letters financed the celebration. Dean hated to see any of the antique cars in the Bunker’s garage leave the herd. But the sale of a mint-condition 1940 Cadillac Fleetwood provided the money for this real vacation and enough in the sock to cover the overhead for a year’s worth of hunting trips, meaning staying in motels with clean sheets, sizable hot water tanks, and decent shower pressure and eating at restaurants that deployed more than a fryer, a microwave, and a flat-top grill.

\-----

Only two courses to their anniversary dinner, served by a wait staff as silent as the fog creeping up the coastline.

Prime Wyoming buffalo and Icelandic Arctic char grilled over apple wood chips and bouquets of rosemary and dill. Steamed fingerling potatoes from Colorado and a side of Minnesota wild rice pilaf to soak up the juices. An assortment of breads and crackers, warm from the oven, wrapped in a linen dish towel, served with sweet butter and ginger marmalade and hazelnut spread on the side. A rainbow platter of sliced heirloom tomatoes drizzled with olive oil and bowls of baby peas crowned with a sprinkle of chopped mint leaves and dabbed with butter. A sideboard of Ecotopian craft brews and wine. To take back to their room: a rare bottle of a smoky single malt from a Scottish island with an unpronounceable name.

And pie. One whole pie, Texas Brown-Sugar Bourbon Pecan with a Shortbread Crust served warm with Vanilla Surprise Frozen Custard, freshly churned.

The dessert’s description had the mouth feel of a John Donne (1572-1631) love sonnet.

[Note: Here is a good place to sample his wares: [John Donne](http://www.sonnets.org/donne.htm)]

Their table for two, perched on the stone overhang of an outdoor patio, was lit by pillars of beeswax, as good as any warding, and the moon and stars.

Sam fed Dean, a bite at a time. Used forks and spoons and his long, nimble fingers. Two spoonfuls for Dean, one for Sam. Two forkfuls for Dean, one for Sam. Small squares of bread and butter, balanced on his fingertips, pressing gently against Dean’s lips, begging to be let in, as if Sam were feeding him kisses.

Sam took his sweet time.

Dean protested to being fed at the start of the meal, but Sam wanted his husband, his lover, settled down, taking what Sam had to give and how he wanted to give it.

They ate silently but flirted with happy moans and light touches, wiping crumbs and stray spills from each other’s lips and chins with soft linen napkins.

When it came to the dessert, they both agreed that Dean needed to taste the vanilla frozen custard on its own before it was mated with the pie. An inevitable match, made in the sweet Heaven both men knew didn’t exist.

The custard was served in a chilled tureen, separate from the pie. Dean let Sam feed him a spoonful, held it in his mouth while it melted, and as if he was evaluating a fine wine, worked it before swallowing.

Dean spoke, for the first time since the meal began. He had found the Surprise.

“Sammy, are there bits of bacon in this ice cream?” he asked.

Sam nodded.

Dean looked like he was going to cry.

Sam carefully cut a slice of the thick-crusted pie into small cubes, so as to maintain a proper balance between filling and crust. He then captured a piece at a time on a fork, capped it off with a cold spoonful of the frozen custard, and slid each bite, with controlled haste, into Dean’s mouth, which was open and eager like that of a baby bird, begging. Soft and pink.

One for Dean, one for Sam.

After they had polished off a quarter of the _best pie ever,_ the frozen custard had melted into a delicious soup. Sam called for two clean bowls and divided up another quarter of the pie between them. He handed the bowls to Dean and put the tureen of custard sauce in front of his husband. Dean, with precision skills earned during a lifetime of eyeballing the proportions of ingredients necessary for life-and-death elixirs, poured out the custard equally into the bowls, drowning the servings of pie in the process.

The two men morphed temporarily into well-schooled toddlers, savoring each spoonful. They emptied their dessert bowls in tandem, with reverence, finishing together.

Sam left a tip of an astonishing heft, practically a roll of new twenties, and shepherded Dean back to their suite, one hand warm on the small of his lover’s back, the other wrapped around the neck of the bottle of single malt.

Dean held a pretty bamboo box cradling the leftover pie.

Our boys showered separately, as if it were the first night of a honeymoon, all about the rituals of what felt a little like a virgin sacrifice.

Their matching silver wedding bands lay side-by-side on a saucer from the kitchen. Although warded to an enchanted level of indestructibility, in the fever of love making the rings were heavy enough to inflict damage. So they were corralled, together, every night, in easy reach, along with the Hunters’ favorite guns and knives and an engraved silver flask of holy water.

Showered, hair squeaky clean, sky-clad under Egyptian sheets. Two shots each of the single malt. Waiting for the next act. Side-by-side, staring at the ceiling of a suite that cost $1,000 a night. A do-not-disturb sign hung on the crystal doorknob. The kitchenette was well stocked, and they planned to have breakfast in bed.

Chuck bless the Men of Letters and their love of fine cars.

Sam rolled over and reached for Dean. And, before he could do more than pull his husband’s food-drugged body into his arms, Dean spoke up.

“Sammy, do you like vanilla?” asked Dean. “I mean, do you really like vanilla? You aren’t just, I don’t know, resigned to vanilla?”

Sam’s big brain had been offline for hours, intoxicated by anticipation even before the meal started. He struggled to cope with Dean’s outburst.

“Christo,” Sam pronounced, only half in jest.

“I ain’t possessed,” huffed Dean.

Sam was distracted by the weight of his lover in his arms and decided the best response was to kiss him into oblivion. But Dean dodged him and put the younger man into a headlock.

“Va-nil-la, Sammy,” Dean repeated, sounding annoyed.

Sam tapped out, as if they were teenagers again, sparring in the back parking lot of the motel du jour.

“Vanilla, Dean? I thought the frozen custard was terrific.”

Was Dean hesitant about the meal? Sam had to stop him from licking crumbs of pie directly from the tabletop.

“That’s not what I mean. The pie, everything, it was awesome. I mean…us. This. Me.” Dean gestured, having loosened his grip on his brother.

Dean’s rosy cheeks were a well-documented tell regarding his emotional state. He repeated himself, sounding a little desperate.

“Vanilla. Dude, are you disappointed?”

Okay. Sam got it. Finally. Paused his roaming hands. Pondered.

By accident, by coincidence, by the machinations of a malicious godling, on more than one occasion Sam had been subjected to a litany of his Dean’s kinky exploits by one of said brother’s one night stands.

It always happened at a bar.

They would sidle up to Sam, who would be minding his own business. Halfway through an uncomfortable, mostly one-sided conversation, he would remind them of Someone. They drunkenly would reminisce about a green-eyed Casanova in a black muscle car, the one who had visited their town on secret spy business, spent one memorable evening, and then, after a tender goodbye kiss, had vanished into the night.

Sam had a pretty good idea of some flavors other than vanilla that Dean had cooked with. And Sam had been to college, where one was expected to Experiment. And he read books. Not naïve about what happened behind other people’s closed doors.

Regardless, Dean had never suggested anything adventurous, and their lovemaking had bordered on chaste. For Sam, it was that good to be with Dean. And he had assumed Dean was happy. But maybe he wasn’t.

Was this his awkward way of asking for more? Different?

Sam thought about their last year together and before that, after Dean said yes, and how every touch between them had been a revelation. So good.

If they had held the line at kissing, Sam still would be the happiest of men. But the line had been crossed, from the beginning of their “New Normal”, and Sam found himself in the category of the publicly inflicted.

“And did you see that tall, long-haired fool who came into the store this morning for donuts and sandwiches and coffee and beer? Couldn’t stop smiling, I’ll tell you. Walked around the whole time he was shopping with a big goofy grin, showing off those dimples and perfect teeth. Wonder what he was on?”

Sam stepped up. Decided he needed to ignore Dean’s sensitive feelings and rip the bandage off. Again.

“I like vanilla,” said Sam. “Actually, I love vanilla. I love vanilla pudding and vanilla icing on sugar cookies. And vanilla malted milk shakes and thick snowy vanilla frosting on white wedding cake. And extra vanilla extract–the good stuff–in whipped cream and meringues and the fillings for sponge cake and trifles made with ladyfingers. And in hard sauce for mince pie.

“I love French vanilla ice cream with those extra egg yolks and vanilla bean sorbet, particularly if you soak the beans in brandy first. Or use the same vanilla-scented brandy in your coffee. And okay, you can add a little chopped bacon or slivers of dark chocolate or crushed black walnuts. Sometimes. But I never will miss the add-ons.”

Sam took a breath. The single malt had loosened his tongue. Meanwhile, unconsciously, as was their new custom, the men, overlapping arms and legs, had anchored themselves to each other, finding out, as they did in the first weeks, that they fit together extremely well.

Consequently, Sam had been pontificating over the top of Dean’s head, which was tucked under his chin. He manhandled them so they could be looking at each other, except Dean was looking down. Dean, the bravest man Sam had ever met, and he could not look Sam in the eye.

“De,” Sam asked, in the same gentle voice he would use with an easily spooked witness during a case interview, “Is this about you? Do you want more than vanilla? Because I’m a happy camper. Let me rephrase that. I am an extremely satisfied camper, who, at the same time, has developed an insatiable lust. For vanilla. I love vanilla, and all I want is more vanilla. But if you want something more than vanilla….”

“Just didn’t want to disappoint you. Don’t want you to get bored. You deserve so much. I love you, Sammy. Want it to be special.”

“Dean, listen. Ask me about vanilla in twenty years. Or thirty. I promise to be honest. Promise. But right now, I am starving. I want vanilla. I want pie. I want you.”

“If you insist,” said Dean. He tried to sigh, couldn’t even pretend to pout, and the patented Dean Smile® broke through the clouds.

Finally, fully engaged, he kicked off the sheet, leaned back far enough to admire his tall husband’s body, and shook his head in disbelief. And leaned in for a familiar melody of kisses, much like turning up the volume of a well-loved soundtrack on Baby’s radio and singing along.

The sign on the door stayed up for three days.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
